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Animals Wild Cities Morocco has 3 million stray dogs. Meet the people trying to help. Animals Whales eat three times more than previously thought. Environment Planet Possible India bets its energy future on solar—in ways both small and big. These changes make visiting the Arctic much easier, safer, and more enjoyable, so almost all tourism in the Arctic occurs in the summertime. This blog post will look at the conditions in the Arctic summer, looking at the daylight hours, the temperature, how long the summer lasts, and the different kinds of wildlife you can expect to find on our various Arctic cruises.
We only travel to the Arctic in summer because the Arctic winter is much too cold and treacherous. The summer offers us a small window of more moderate weather with which to venture into this extreme environment, and the payoffs are huge, with incredible scenery, landscapes, and wildlife.
Summer in the Arctic varies from year to year, and from area to area. As you get further south from the North Pole, the hours of summer daylight drop a little, but places like Svalbard, Canada, and Iceland which is just outside of the Arctic circle still stay bright after midnight. This warming-up process is relatively quick, however, so visitors during this time may even notice a significant difference in temperature and in the landscape during this time.
However, the Arctic also cools down again just as quickly, with temperatures dropping rapidly in August and September. Wetter than normal conditions are expected to continue over several Arctic regions: Chukchi and Bering, Alaska, Eastern Canada and Canadian Archipelago.
Historically, there is not high confidence in the precipitation forecast over the Arctic in June, July, and August Sea-ice: The northern hemisphere March sea-ice extent maximum was the 7th lowest since , driven by significant absences of ice in the Bering Sea, Barents Sea and the East Coast of Canada. For summer , lower to near normal ice cover is the predominant forecast for the Arctic, while early to near normal break-up of sea ice is expected for most regions. For the first time, the outlook includes a Snow water equivalent probabilistic seasonal forecast — a new experimental product.
Skip to main content. Warmer than average summer forecast in the Arctic. Tags: Arctic. He says:. In , Arctic summer sea ice reached its lowest level on record — in part due to a large storm hitting the ice in August. A landmark report on oceans and ice published this year by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IPCC found that up to half of the observed decline in summer sea ice could be down to natural variability in the Arctic climate.
A study published in calculated that natural variability in the Arctic system amounted to around two decades of uncertainty. This means that any ice-free summer forecast may need to have a year window, just to account for the influence of natural events and processes. It could probably take longer. This is because all the field results from MOSAiC will first need to be analysed, then published in peer-reviewed scientific journals — and then relayed to the climate modelling community, says Haapala.
A major concern is that Arctic sea ice is shifting so rapidly that climate modellers may not be able to keep up with the pace of change, says Rackow:. It could be that reality overtakes our ability to make predictions. The point at which the Arctic sees its first ice-free summer will have repercussions both in the polar region and beyond. One industry that has followed sea-ice forecasting research with keen interest is commercial shipping. For many, the shortest route between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans would be through the Arctic — but the presence of thick sea ice has prevented passage for all but the hardiest ships.
The disappearance of sea ice in the summer would allow ships to find a new, faster route between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. A study published in found that routes across the Arctic could become available for standard open-water vessels by the middle of the century. A study published in found that the expansion of commercial shipping poses a significant threat to a wide range of Arctic marine mammals, including narwhals, bowhead whales, belugas and polar bears.
She tells Carbon Brief:. Ice is also an environment that carries organisms from other parts of the Arctic to the central Arctic — so this could have implications for what seeding populations are there during the growing season.
A study published in found that sea ice decline could be making it harder for polar bears to find food. The preferred prey of polar bears is the ringed seal, which the bears hunt from the ice surface.
The study tracked a group of female bears living in the Beaufort Sea in and found that, on average, bears were travelling further to find food than in previous years — and expending more energy in the process. Though a clear link has yet to be established, it is possible that the reason bears are travelling longer distances is because declining sea ice is leaving them with fewer places to hunt seals, Dr Anthony Pagano , a research follow at the Institute for Conservation Research at San Diego Zoo, told Carbon Brief in If that trend continues, we would expect continued declines in reproductive success.
A second study published this year found that polar bears may tune their foraging behaviour to be in line with the pattern of ice growth and retreat seen each year. Changes to ice conditions affect indigenous human populations, too, says Holland.
People living in lower-latitude regions could also be affected, though less directly, by sea ice decline. A growing field of research suggests that changes to sea ice could be affecting weather elsewhere, particularly in mid-latitude regions. Scientists have noted that the recent rapid changes in the Arctic seem to have coincided with a period of more frequent extreme weather events across the northern hemisphere. Such events include severe winters in the US, Canada and Europe , as well as heatwaves and droughts.
Some scientists believe that the two phenomena are linked. Exactly how changes in the Arctic could be driving increases in extreme weather events in the mid-latitudes is still up for debate. Carbon Brief this year published a detailed explainer examining the proposed mechanisms. Research published in found that Arctic sea ice decline could have caused a doubling in the likelihood of extreme cold winters in Eurasia. A later study found that Arctic warming could also be linked to more intense heatwaves in the northern hemisphere.
Using climate models, the researchers found that declines in sea ice do not always precede cold winters. More research will be needed to understand the true impacts of dramatic Arctic decline — both in the region and beyond, says Fong:.
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